Kelly: When gunfire is part of the daily soundtrack

Mike Kelly is a Record columnist. He may be contacted at kellym@northjersey.com.

THE WOMAN with the missing teeth answered after I knocked on the door of her Jersey City home. As she opened the door, a smell of stale urine wafted from inside. She peered at me, then looked down the street.

“What do you want?” she asked.

I asked if she was the mother of Lawrence Campbell, who was killed by police after he gunned down Jersey City rookie cop Melvin Santiago outside an all-night drug store a week ago.

She nodded.

“Why did your son kill a police officer?” I asked.

She shook her head.

“I don’t want to talk,” she said as she shut the door.

It was another week and another shooting in another New Jersey city – a shooting that makes no sense.

On July 5, 12-year-old Genesis Rincon was shot to death as she rode her scooter down the block in Paterson’s 4th Ward. Police theorize that the three men who were arrested and charged with Rincon’s killing were really shooting at someone else.

But who? Why?

Just before dawn last Sunday,

Police Officer Melvin Santiago was shot to death as he responded to reports of an armed robbery at an all-night drug store on Jersey City’s John F. Kennedy Boulevard.

Takes guard’s gun

Before Officer Santiago arrived, police say, Lawrence Campbell, 27, walked into the Walgreen’s drug store and reportedly asked an armed security guard about a new-born baby card that Campbell pretended to be buying. (Keep in mind, this was 4 a.m.) When the guard looked away, Campbell wrestled the guard’s gun away. Then, Campbell allegedly proclaimed to bystanders to watch the news because he was about to become “famous.”

Someone phoned in a 9-1-1 call to police about a possible armed robbery. Officer Santiago was the first cop on the scene. Campbell allegedly ambushed Santiago as he stepped from his police cruiser, killing him instantly with a shot to the head. Other Jersey City officers who followed Santiago to the scene then shot Campbell to death.

Santiago was 23, a police officer for less than a year. Campbell was 27. He had a criminal record and was being sought by police for questioning in another shooting.

But gunning down a police officer? Why?

Campbell has been described by at least one tabloid as a “lunatic.” Maybe that’s true. So far, law enforcement authorities have been unable to develop a complete picture of what drove him to kill Officer Santiago or his mental state. Whatever the case, however, Campbell’s troubles, which may in fact be some sort of mental disorder or perhaps a deep anger over the hardships of life, pushed him to take out his frustrations by resorting to violence.

And the impact of that violence on the lives of others is what is so alarming.

To go to Genesis Rincon’s neighborhood in Paterson and to Lawrence Campbell’s in Jersey City is to step into a world of fear, despair, anger and hollow-eyed frustration. To live there, residents say, is to constantly worry about violence, mostly from drug gangs.

Most of New Jersey rarely gets a glimpse of this world – except when a horrific murder takes place and we are presented with a victim such as a 12-year-old girl on a scooter or a 23-year-old rookie police officer who was merely trying to respond to a report of a robbery at a drug store. Yet, for the residents of this world, violence is an ongoing part of life.

Gunshots amid prayers

Last Sunday, around 5 a.m., the Rev. Dr. John Algera, the pastor of the Madison Avenue Christian Reformed Church in Paterson, began his morning prayers. Algera did not know it yet, but an hour earlier in Jersey City, Officer Santiago had been killed.

Algera grew up in Wyckoff, one of the most peaceful and crime-free towns in Bergen County. But for the past three decades, he has lived and worked in downtown Paterson. Algera’s home on 25th Street is not necessarily considered a violent neighborhood. Certainly it is considered much safer than the corner on Rosa Parks Boulevard where Genesis Rincon was gunned down.